We seek not rest but transformation.
We are dancing through each other as doorways.
We are ripples crossing and fusing, journeying and returning
from the core of the apple, the eye of the mandala,
the cave in the heart of the rose,
the circle without boundaries centered on silence.
–Marge Piercy, from “Circling”

We design enfolded in the rich, transdisciplinary rise and texture of
the encircling Earth, which is also our body, which is also the
uncoiling possibility spaces of thriving. Regenerative design is a set
of living systems design approaches that offers a wide-armed embrace of
related ecomimetic and systems design practices including
sustainability, permaculture, whole systems, biomimetic, and ecological
design. Participants in a graduate course at Prescott College describe
some of the key strengths of designing, beyond sustainability, for
regeneration. These groundswelling approaches can inspire living
buildings and regenerative architecture, and guide ecosocial planning
and design at multiple scales for social justice integration and
biocultural thriving.

The first principle of social permaculture is that the universe is
inherently benevolent and creative (Aal & Adair, 2008). In our
graduate course we held universal friendliness as a key design
principle. We co-authored this collaborative inquiry with the idea of
benevolent, creative universe as a design lens for the three practices
of regenerative systems design we explore.

Creative Flow in Regenerative Design

Active engagement in creative flow requires an intuitive, reflective,
and expansive appreciation for the energetic systems and socially
constructed realities design both promotes and challenges. The creative
cycle is an intuitive process that requires aesthetical feedback and
understanding while letting go, exploring the unknown areas of inner and
outer worlds. The ability to replicate, through various forms of art,
the intricate and seemingly eccentric ways of nature demands attention
to the source.
The exploration of one’s personal creative flow offers opportunities
for considering intentional interactions that are rooted in a desire to
create and reflect universal kindness, a source of infinite patterns,
rhythms, tones, and pulsating energies, all fractalized harmoniously
(see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Original Artwork by J. Killingsworth (2016)

Relationships also ask for a quality of presence and commitment,
advocacy and refinement. We let go into the unknown while maintaining
trust in our universal interconnectedness. Futurists such as Soleri and
Callebaut can contribute to regenerative design through art,
architecture, urban planning, biomimicry, and ecology by creating living
systems for sustainable actions.
Regenerative Design Prompt 1: Connect it. Visualize and design to
strengthen the hidden or potential flows of connection, kinship,
relationship, gratitude, and synergy.

Honoring Feedback

Honoring feedback includes activating and opening to the reverberance
of the cosmos in and through design colleagues, inspired by universal
friendliness. Feedback is present in all aspects of experience. From the
naturally occurring processes around us to the music we choose and the
interactions we have with others. The systems within our bodies
continually provide subtle feedback to sustain life. When such processes
fail, we struggle to survive; when we learn to turn this wisdom inside
out, we thrive.
Honoring feedback requires self-knowledge and reflection as well as a
willingness to listen with empathetic openness to the learning needs of
others. Feedback allows for ecosocial systems corrections, reduction of
frictions, and the nourishment of brave and creative collaboration.
Reverberance is a quality of feedback that happens concurrently at
multiple scales and in amplifying emergence. Designs honoring our
feelings saturated in contexts of biocultural depth, meaning, and
embedment catalyze the regeneration of Earth within, which we might
think of as Earth congruence, Earth empathy, or Earth reverberance.
Regenerative Design Prompt 2: Cycle it. Close three loops to allow your design to speak with itself. Generate positive feedback.

Embodied Practice

Embodied practice opens the flows of feedback through the physical,
emotional, and relational experience of interacting with learning,
meaning-making, and active participation in the adaptive co-creation of
reality with all members of a given community, including the
more-than-human world. This practice reconciles the often privileged
rational stream of perception and decision-making with many other flows
of available information. Each practitioner becomes a network of
integrated perceptions, responses, and ideas in and of themselves,
within a greater network of individuals participating in cooperative
community creativity.
Regenerative Design Prompt 3: Thrive it. Embed yourself within the Earthly matrix, and within the design process and design.

Conclusion

Regenerative design views the generation of these vibrant,
bioculturally responsive meshes as vital and congruent in both process
and form. The designs and designer-context-Gaian mesh-bodies become a
portalway of multispecies collaborative embodiment and co-presence.
Regenerative designs can encourage the interconnection between people
and the dynamic forces of nature through regenerative curriculum, art,
architecture, agriculture, rituals, and community engagement. Through
universal friendliness, regenerative design holds the potential to
decentralize inequities in wealth and power and ensure Earthly thriving.

Earth Empathy

Gaian Methodologies

About Us

The Institute for Earth Regenerative Studies offers graduate and certificate programs at the convergence of creativity, eco-restoration, and the living wisdom traditions in the Pacific Cascadia bioregion.